"The Hand Dance"
installation is an immersive virtual reality
performance in which up to three performers interact with a
stereoscopic virtual environment. The movement of each
performers' hands is tracked in space using a VICON motion
tracking system. The user wears gloves that contain retroreflective
markers, allowing the gesture and position of each hand to be tracked
in real time. This information is used to control the motion of an
avatar's hands in a 3D environment. Performance are done in
different virtual environments in which gesture plays a critical role :
pottery, in which a potter controls the shape of the ceramic vase being
thrown on the potter's wheel, the road traffic in which a
policeman uses gesture to communicate with cars and pedestrians at busy
intersections, and the gesture narration as when an Indian dancer uses
gesture to tell stories by evoking metaphorical images. The system is
equipped with a gesture recognition algorithm to control the virtual
environment. Thus the motion of the hands controls each environment in
a different way, depending on the context. From the outside of the
installation, the audience can see the motion tracked hands of the
users reinterpreted in real time by the hand dance system and projected
on the screen overhead. Although each of the perfomers is performing
different gestures, the overhead projection unifies these gestures into
a single performance in which each gesture is accompanied by the sound
of a unique musical instrument. In this way, the performers are not
only controlling their own digital environment, but they are also
communicating with one another, entertaining an audience, and may be
inviting additional performers from the audience.

Biographies

Elvira Todaro
is PhD Student
on Scuola Superiore Sant'Anna of Pisa working in the field of
Innovative technologies for cultural heritage at the PERCRO Laboratory,
directed by prof. Massimo Bergamasco, in Pisa, Italy. Her design
experience spans graphic design, typography, corporate identity
development, digital video, advertising and digital media design. Her
work is included in the 2007 Biennale di Cinema di Venezia, and
recently she worked as a graphic designer and Communication workshop
assistant for the Communication Lab, a Communication Degree Course of
the University of Pisa. Prior to this, she worked as a Videomaker and
Graphic Designer at Emage multimedia lab, of Grazia Neri, a well-known
Photography and video company in Milan. For Emage she was
videojournalist Reporter for Corriere della Sera, assistant producer
for the Filmmaster society, and assistant editor of backstage
television spots for Lavazza and Tim. She worked on projects including
interfaces for various consumer products, video, DVD and CD-ROMs for
such clients as Alessi, RAS and Cagiva. She won a first award (1999),
at the competition "Il mobile in valigia" Politecnico di
Milano, Go, Industrial design Magazine "Interni", with her
product "Flash". She now enjoys working in Tuscany on
projects of cultural design, and development the territory and small
reality. She especially likes projects trying to reach targets such as
social integration, economic development and urban regeneration trough
arts and cultural growth, and to attend events concerning cultural
information and communication. Her research interests in the PERCRO
Laboratory are in the field of Innovative technology for cultural
heritage, in particular, preservation, fruition and communication
design for cultural heritage (Virtual Architecture, Virtual Museums,
multisensory interaction in Virtual Museum Exhibitions and Digital
Libraries).

Haakon Faste
is PhD Student
at the PERCRO Perceptual Robotics Laboratory at the Scuola Superiore
Sant'Anna in Pisa, Italy, focusing on virtual experience design
for cultural heritage networks. He shares his time between Italy and
the United States. Haakon studied both studio art and physics at
Oberlin College, and has worked for over 12 years in the fields of
visual art, product design and virtual reality. His work has appeared
in many prominent American and European exhibitions including Galapagos
Art Space and Studio 59 in New York City, La Biennale della Toscana and
Palazzo Vivarelli Colonna in Florence, Italy, and the XI Biennial of
Young Artists from Europe and the Mediterranean in Athens, Greece. He
recently finished a major public commission for the City of Mountain
View, California. Before beginning his PhD, he was an interaction and
software experiences designer with IDEO Product Development in Palo
Alto California. In this capacity he led design strategy,
implementation, technology innovation and IP strategy on creative
projects for some of the world's most innovative corporations,
including Toyota, Microsoft, Yahoo!, Intel and Cisco Systems. During
this time he also assisted as Juror for the ZeroOne International
Festival of Digital Arts / IDEO residency program in San Jose,
California, and "IDEO Selects: Works from the permanent
collection" at the Cooper-Hewett National Design Museum, which
opens this summer in New York. Prior to IDEO he worked with clients
including Rolling Stone, the Whitney Museum of American Art and
DavidBowie.com. For several years he also worked at Fakespace
Laboratories designing virtual reality hardware devices for clients
including Ford, NASA Ames and Los Alamos National Research Laboratories.